Jim Commentucci / The Post-StandardSyracuse firefighters train hoses on a burning home at 1822 S. State St. this morning.Syracuse, NY -- A devastating fire that left a family of five homeless today was caused by a resident who turned on the stove and then left the house, a Syracuse fire investigator said.
The fire began in the kitchen on the first floor at the rear of single-family house at 1822 S. State St., said Lt. Ken Heffernan, a Syracuse fire investigator. The resident had turned on two burners of the gas stove and then left to go to the store while his wife slept, Heffernan.

There were no smoke detectors in the house but the wife was awakened by an alarm in her Time-Warner Cable alarm-system keypad, Heffernan said.

James Bolds of Baker Avenue was walking along Beard Place when he saw flames and smoke pouring from the rear of the single-family house at 1822 S. State St.

Bolds said he called 911, jumped a fence around the property and began knocking on the back door and windows to rouse any residents inside.

Firefighters arrived at about the same time, and one came racing around to the back to where Bolds was banging on the door.

“When the firefighter kicked in the door flames and smoke came billowing out, forcing us back to the front,” Bolds said.

The fire was reported at 11: 27 a.m.

A heavy volume of smoke and flames confronted firefighters when they arrived on the scene, said Deputy Chief Ed Kurtz. They also had a report of a person inside, he said.

Firefighters searched the second floor until they were forced out when the fire surrounded them in the ceiling and walls, Kurtz said. By that time firefighters had learned that everyone was out of the building, he said.

“There was a tremendous volume of fire there,” Kurtz said.

Initially, the woman who discovered the fire thought her husband was still at home, he said. She didn’t know he had gone to the store, Kurtz said.

Four engines, three trucks and a rescue company responded to the scene.

Thick black smoke swept across South State Street, at times covering onlookers. Flames poured out of the rear of the home as firefighters in a side yard trained three hoses on the building and another set of firefighters on a ladder focused their hose on the attic and roof of what was once a well-kept, blue sided, Victorian home.

Water cascaded down the front steps, past a two-story pine tree and into the street.

The building will be demolished Monday, Lt. Ken Heffernan said. No firefighters were injured fighting the blaze, which took about an hour to put out, he said.

The Central New York Chapter of the American Red Cross also responded to the scene.